The 5 Basic Ballet Positions

Jodie Gates has been working professionally at the highest level in the dance world for over twenty years. She has worked with the Joffrey Ballet, Frankfurt Ballet, Pennsylvania Ballet, Paris Opera Ballet, Scottish Ballet, San Francisco Ballet, Houston Ballet, Complexions Contemporary Ballet and Miami City Ballet among others. Now a nationally recognized choreographer, she is also a guest teacher for professional dance companies internationally and stages the ballets of William Forsythe around the world. Gates is a Professor of Dance at the University of California, Irvine and is founder and artistic director of CaDance, which presents the annual Laguna Dance Festival in Laguna Beach, California. Her professional dance career began with the Joffrey Ballet in New York City under the artistic direction of Robert Joffrey. In 1995, she joined The Pennsylvania Ballet as a principal ballerina, performing title roles in numerous full-length classical ballets. She then danced for four years as a soloist with William Forsythe’s Ballet Frankfurt in Frankfurt, Germany. She has worked as rehearsal director for the Joffrey Ballet and Complexions Contemporary Ballet, and guest taught for dance companies such as Pennsylvania Ballet, Momix, Hubbard Street Dance Company, Paul Taylor Dance Company, Washington Ballet, Aspen/Santa Fe Ballet, Parsons Dance Company, The Scottish Ballet, Matthew Bourne’s touring company of ‘Swan Lake,’ Joffrey Ballet, and Ballet Frankfurt. Jodie recently finished touring internationally and has appeared as a principal artist and teacher throughout North and South America, Mexico, Russia, Asia, Australia and Europe. She has been featured in two PBS Great Performances' series and other television events, including a special presentation performance at the White House in Washington, D.C., 'The Tonight Show,' with Jay Leno and has appeared in several commercial and video works. She can be seen featured on video as ''the women in red' in The Joffrey Ballet's Billboards, a full-length rock ballet set to music by the musical artist Prince. Jodie’s most recent choreographic credits include Barely Silent for Complexions Contemporary Ballet, premiered in NYC at the Joyce Theater in January 2007; Minor Loop for the Washington Ballet in June 2006; Naked Exchange for the University of California, Irvine in February 2007; Momentary Play, in NYC for Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet October 2005; now and again, at The Joyce Theater, created for Ballet N/Y in 2005; In the Arms of Morpheus for the Phrenic New Ballet of Philadelphia in 2004; Somewhere/In-Between, for Ballet Pacifica in 2003, Por Ti, for American Ballet Theater’s summer workshop in 2003; and Vinyasa, for Pennsylvania Ballet dancers in 2000.